The scandal surrounding Thailand's Tiger Temple, where wildlife officers seized 137 big cats this past week, has cast religious sanctuaries for animals in a bad light. Many conservationists and animal rights activists have believed the temple's self-appointed mission to shelter tigers is misguided at best and that the tigers were mistreated to ensure their docility.

On the invitation of Government of Pakistan, a 43-member delegation of Sri Lankan ministers, senior Monks/Religious Scholars, media representatives and pilgrims left for Pakistan on May 29, 2016 to attend first-ever Wesak Festival hosted by the Government of Pakistan at Taxila from 29th May to 1st June 2016.

Wildlife officials in Thailand have begun removing some of the 137 tigers held at a Buddhist temple following accusations that the monks were involved in illegal breeding and trafficking of the animals.

Marking the celebration of Vesak, the government of Pakistan has loaned sacred bone relics of the Buddha to Sri Lanka, now on public display in a series of expositions at temples across the island nation. Sri Lankan president Maithripala Sirisena and prime minster Ranil Wickramasinghe inaugurated the expositions at a ceremony on 21 May at Temple Trees

On Saturday 4 October, Daylesford Dharma School held a fund-raiser entitled “Comedy 4 Karma” at Daylesford Town Hall—a night of big names, big laughs, and good karma—raising much-needed funds for the first officially recognized Buddhist school in Australia. One of only three schools of its type in the world, Daylesford Dharma School is committed to its investment in compassionate education to develop a kinder and more peaceful world.

A project to build an Indian Institute of Bodh Darshan (IIBD) at Tabo Monastery in India has been announced by Himachal Pradesh chief minister Virbhadra Singh. Located in the Lahaul and Spiti district, the ancient monastery will be receiving Rs. 45 crore (approximately US$7.5 million) to build the international Buddhist learning institute.

Lewis Lancaster and his longtime friend Danny Tam are the dynamic duo of Buddhist prison visitation. In an interview with this website in 2013, the emeritus professor of East Asian languages at UC Berkeley spoke eloquently about how his ministry with the International Bodhisattva Sangha Prison Program (of which Mr. Tam is chief financial officer) had transformed the lives of inmates across California’s state prisons. Prof. Lancaster and Mr. Tam have introduced inmates to Buddhism and taught them meditation, and are now offering an accredited course on Buddhism at Calipatria State Prison (in collaboration with Buddhist college University of the West)

The Dalai Lama told German newspaper Welt am Sonntag in a recent interview that he sees no need for a successor to follow him. The Tibetan leader told the paper:
"We had a Dalai Lama for almost five centuries. The 14th Dalai Lama now is very popular. Let us then finish with a popular Dalai Lama."

“In the world now, there is violence in the name of religion. Therefore it is important for India to raise its voice, and India is perhaps the only country that can bring peace in the world if it follows the Buddha’s teachings,” said Modi.

The Blessed One was once living at Kosambi in a wood of simsapa trees. He picked up a few leaves in his hand, and he asked the bhikkhus, ‘How do you conceive this, bhikkhus, which is more, the few leaves that I have picked up in my hand or those on the trees in the wood?

Sariputra was born in a village in Magadha at southern India. His father was a noted Brahmin scholar. When his mother conceived him, she had extraordinary wisdom, which was believed to be influenced by the baby in her womb. Even her younger brother, also a noted scholar, was defeated in every discussion with her. Knowing that his sister conceived a baby who would become a man of great wisdom, he left home to search for more knowledge so as not to be outdone by his nephew in future.

Among the disciples of the Buddha, Venerable Ananda had the most retentive memory. Ananda joined the Sangha when he was a child. It was said that he became a monk together with Aniruddha and Bhadra. Initially when the four Sakyas princes became monks, Ananda was the youngest of all.

All this happened in the year 623 before the birth of Christ according to the traditional way of counting, but from historical research some doubts have arisen about this calculation, which is based on a fundamental date, a treaty of Chandragupta with the Greek Seleucus Nicator, which date however is not quite certain. Even the indication of years before or after Christ is not to be fixed with historical certainty, as there is probably a discrepancy of several years in the date of his birth. Recent historians place the birth of prince Siddhattha about the year 563 B.C.